Phillips is vice president and chief technology officer at Sandia National Laboratories, where she is responsible for leading the laboratory’s approximately $160 million Laboratory Directed Research and Development program, research strategy development and implementation, and intellectual property protection and deployment. She came to Sandia after 14 years at AT&T Bell Laboratories. At Sandia, she has served as deputy chief technology officer and director of laboratory research strategy and partnerships; director of nuclear weapons science and technology programs; director of the Physical, Chemical, and Nano Science Center; and director of the Department of Energy (DOE) Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies at Sandia and Los Alamos national laboratories.

Phillips is a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Materials Research Society (MRS), American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the American Physical Society (APS). She served on the AAAS board of directors and is past chair of the APS Topical Group on Energy Research and Applications, and the APS Division of Condensed Matter Physics.

She has served on the editorial boards of Journal of Materials Research, Journal of Applied Physics, and Applied Physics Reviews. She has edited two books, written three book chapters, and prepared more than 100 journal publications, 12 major review articles, and 45 refereed conference proceedings publications. She also holds five patents. Phillips has a B.S. in physics from the College of William and Mary and a Ph.D. in applied physics from Yale University.